Pinkie Pie was leaving Sweet Apple Acres when her mane started to twitch, quickly spreading to her whole body and making her shiver uncontrollably for a few seconds.
“Wow, that was the dooziest doozy since… well, since Twilight believed in my Pinkie Sense! And this one is serious! I should go get the girls...”
Her ears dropped for a moment as Pinkie recalled the recent events. She had just helped nurse Redheart make Rarity and Applejack - bedridden with some mysterious blue flu - comfortable in Sweet Apple Acres. (Oh, I hope they enjoy the balloons and streamers!) Fluttershy was out of town to see some magical creatures. Rainbow Dash was still unaccounted for, probably napping in some cloud. And Twilight was last seen flying something big and golden to the north, out of town, with Cadance.
She looked back to Sweet Apple Acres and thought of the Cutie Mark Crusaders. No, better not; this could get dangerous. Besides, the fillies were tired from getting Rarity, Applejack, and Redheart to Applejack’s house as fast as possible, and soon after cried themselves to sleep, Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom out of concern for their sisters, and Scootaloo concerned with her friends.
The Pinkie Sense flared up again, and Pinkie’s irises shrunk. “It’s coming from the Everfree Forest. Somepony is in danger! I have to find Zecora!”
She set out for the Everfree Forest at a gallop, thankful for having her saddlebags; she had just decorated Applejack’s bedroom to help in her and Rarity’s recovery. Without her friends she might need every bit of help she could get.
Zecora was preparing for a trip deeper into Everfree, cautiously adding to her saddlebags a selection of potions and powders she might need. She gave a last look at a book on top of her table, reading the bookmarked passage one last time and committing it to memory. “Without preparation running to the goal is the province of foals and fools.”
Satisfied that everything was in order for her trip, Zecora took a small drum, put on her cloak, and left her hut. Closing its front door, she started down a little used path, repeating an old rhyme on her head.
Pinkie was moving at a brisk pace still, but she had reverted to her usual hopping, a smile on her face. Her Pinkie Sense was still flaring from time to time, but she couldn’t sense real harm yet.
Besides, anypony would have to be crazy to face the Everfree Forest while gloomy!
Passing through a bend in the path, Pinkie saw Zecora’s familiar hut inside a tree, but there was no light on the windows. She quickly knocked, fidgeting all the while. “Zecora, are you there?”
Not getting any answer, Pinkie cautiously opened the door and entered the hut, silently looking around… or, at least, attempted to do so, tripping on the welcome mat in the dark and crashing on the center table. The small round table swayed a bit but didn’t fall.
“Ouch! You know what this needs?” Pinkie left the hut and picked something from the hollow of a nearby tree. “Some candles!”
She picked a tray from a shelf close to the hut’s front door, set about a dozen party candles, and put it on top of the table, close to a book. “Way better. Now, let’s -”
Her Pinkie Sense flared again, sending shivers through her whole body.
“Oh, right. Find zecora.”
Putting a deerstalker hat, Pinkie blowed a few bubbles out of her calabash pipe. Taking the pipe on her hoof, she started. “It’s clear that Zecora…”
Focus, Pinkie! Twilight is not here to correct me! Now what would Twilight do?
“Look for clues!” She pulled out a magnifying glass and went through the shelves. “Spaces where something was clearly removed!” She looked around in the hut. “Zecora’s cloak and saddlebags are missing! She went out, but where?”
Pinkie’s glance fell on the book next to her candles. Noticing a bookmark, she opened the book and started reading.
Round the house tree the hero went, into the forest’s dim,
Through winding trail, past trees bent, ‘til the waterfall’s gleam.
Down the sideway a leap of faith, right out of water still,
Hopping through the hidden path, behind the clear veil.
Into darkness with nary a light, courage held in heart,
With music made into a shield, to the sun with a start.
Down to the floor the hero looked, journey’s end in sight,
In the warm the dragon basked, nary a worry in mind.
Confusion was soon apparent on her face. “A nursery rhyme? I know this one, Nana Pinkie used to sing it to me.”
“Wait just a minute, if Zecora was reading this…” Pinkie blowed out the candles and rushed outside, looking around. She soon found hoofprints on a narrow trail that went roughly in the direction her Pinkie Sense was pointing earlier. The first verse of the rhyme came to her.
“Round the house tree the hero went, into the forest’s dim,
Through winding trail, past trees bent, ‘til the waterfall’s gleam.”
Pinkie’s smile returned, wider than ever. “Hey, I know where Zecora went!”
Zecora approached the waterfall swiftly but cautiously. Reaching the top of the waterfall she looked to the right; a narrow path was barely visible, winding down the cliff and ending in a shallow pool of water in front of the waterfall, still high in the cliff.
Taking out her cane, Zecora tested the water curtain, finding solid ground less than a pony length away behind the waterfall. “The path is still where I remember; seems like the magic still holds its embers.”
Closing her cloak to protect her bags from the water, Zecora jumped across the water curtain, landing on a platform a little longer than a pony floating in the air. In the hidden space behind the waterfall was a cave entrance, about twice further than a pony could jump without a running start. A set of three evenly spaced floating stones, each barely large enough for two hooves, covered the space between her and the cave.
Zecora took a moment to calm herself and find her balance; a fall would just drop her in the deep pool at the bottom of the waterfall, but it would mean over an hour of backtracking and ruin the contents of her saddlebags. Rising on her hind legs, Zecora took three practiced hops, crossing the gap with ease.
As she glanced down the dark cave, shifting her drum to the front, Zecora formed a smile. She stole a quick look at the floating stones.
“Down the sideway a leap of faith, right out of water still,”
“Hopping through the hidden path, behind the clear veil.”
Pinkie considered the words as, magnifying glass at the ready, she followed the hoofprints down a sidepath. The hoofprints soon ended on a shallow pool.
Pinkie scratched her chin. “Well, I guess this is the ‘water still’. Now what was that about a leap of faith?”
Her eyes locked in the part of the waterfall just ahead. “Oh, veil.” Donning her umbrella hat, Pinkie stretched her neck to look behind the water. She immediately saw the platform, the cave, and…
“What in the name of pink?”
She jumped to the platform behind the water to get a better look at the small floating stones.
“How is anypony supposed to stand on those stones? There is no space! How did Zecora even…”
A memory of Zecora balancing herself on a single hoof came back to Pinkie, bringing her a confused look.
“Oh, yeah, she can do that. But now I have no idea how to hop-hoppit after her! Zecora looks as light as a balloon when she does that, how can anypony else...”
Her eyes trailed to her saddlebags, the same ones she was using when she decorated Applejack’s and Rarity’s bedroom. “Oooh, this is gonna be fun!”
A few seconds later, holding a bunch of inflated balloons, Pinkie was floating between the stones, kicking them to propel herself forward while giggling madly.
Touching down in the tunnel’s entrance, Pinkie’s ears perked. “Wait, is that drums?” Taking a step ahead she shouted at the top of her lungs. “Zecora, wait! Why are you there in the dark?”
Zecora marched down the tunnel, using her front right leg to hit her small travel drum at every step, a rattle just below the rings on her front left leg providing extra rhythm. The rhythmic sound drowned out every other noise and helped her meditate, her serene meditation stance keeping any hint of fear away.
“Strange creatures the ones in this tunnel be; driven by sound, but drawn by fear and when light they see.”
She could already see the tunnel lighting up ahead of her; the exit would be just after a couple bends. Heart alight with the prospect of seeing her old friend again, Zecora thought of the challenge just past.
“Into darkness with nary a light, courage held in heart,”
“With music made into a shield, to the sun with a start.”
Pinkie looked down the tunnel, where the sound of a drum was getting fainter.
“Sooo… Zecora went inside banging a drum and without a light, just like the rhyme. Lots of sound and no light, heh, it’s like there are Eurgs there. I guess it’s music time!”
In a blur, Pinkie took from her saddlebags a bunch of instruments and strapped them to her body. A pair of cymbals to her front legs, a banjo at her front, maracas to her hind legs, and a tambourine to her left flank.
“Well, I don’t have the bulky ones and I can’t use the harmonica and flute because I want to sing, but music is music!”
With a smile on her face and sounding like a one pony band, Pinkie started down the dark cave.
“When I was a little filly and the sun was going down…”
Zecora stepped out of the cave and into a small plateau, deep inside a ravine. She stopped playing her drum, took a breath -
And ran to the edge of the plateau. She could feel something wrong; tuning out the strange sounds coming from the cave, Zecora looked at the bottom of the ravine, where a figure in a dark blue cloak was directing about a dozen diamond dogs.
In the middle was a large figure, similar in shape to a sea serpent but shorter, covered in white fur and with four blue-tipped wings. The creature - her friend, a luck dragon - was struggling to escape some kind of glowing magical net.
Zecora’s irises shrunk as she collapsed to the ground, fear clear on her face, as the sound coming from the cave lost its musical quality.
Pinkie was reaching the cave exit when her Pinkie Sense hit again in a short but very strong burst. She could sense something very wrong ahead.
“Zecora!”
Pinkie accelerated to a gallop, forsaking the music. Despite the now chaotic sound from the instruments still attached to her body she could feel something stirring behind her and giving chase.
Feeling like something was nipping at her heels, Pinkie finally saw Zecora trying to stand at the edge of a plateau. She exited the cave in a burst of speed, whatever was following her stopping just shy of the cave exit, and noticed what Zecora was looking at.
“Those mean pants! I’ll get down there and teach them a lesson!”
Think, Pinkie. There are more meanies there than a pony can handle!
“But I bet a hero can! If Rainbow Dash (grunt) can clear the sky in ten seconds flat (oof), I can get into a costume - “ Pinkie slid a purple mask over her face and put on a large mauve hat “ - in half that time!”
Zecora was so distracted by the scene below that she was taken by surprise when a purple blur passed her, sliding down the cliffside and breaking her fall with a cape.
In the moment between the strangely clad pony landing and the diamond dogs noticing her Zecora was able to get a better look. Wide hat and body suit in bright mauve, mask and cape in dark purple. She had that costume described to her a few times in the past, and she had a good idea who the pony - or ponies - behind the mask might be. A quick glance at a pair of saddlebags and small pile of discarded musical instruments to the side confirmed her suspicion.
Pinkie Pie? By the sky!
Zecora shook her head to clear her confusion and quickly scanned the ground below just as Pinkie sidestepped a diamond dog that jumped on her from behind; It was as if she knew where each attacker would come from. She was even maneuvering herself to stay on top of a rocky outcropping where the dogs couldn’t burrow. Did she fight diamond dogs in the past?
The cloaked figure was looking less than thrilled. “Your idiots, get that pony now!”
Zecora focused on the luck dragon and the magical net that bound him, searching for anything that could be serving as an anchor for the magic. There; three crystals set around the dragon, glowing in time with the net.
“Break those crystals, Mare-Do-Well; without them ends the spell.” Said Zecora as she started to pick a couple powder bags from her saddlebags.
Pinkie nodded in acknowledgement and started for the crystals. As she left the rocky ground a pair of dogs burrowed; Pinkie would be in trouble soon without help.
Zecora picked some dust from one bag, conjuring a wind and whispering into it. She then threw another bag, closed, into the wind, and saw it sail to the luck dragon in his net. It was a gamble, but the best chance she would get.
As Pinkie was reaching the first crystal the bag struck, the spilling powder dissolving a few of the net’s strands. “Your net has a hole now, old friend; help the pony that your freedom defends.”
The luck dragon didn’t move, but his eyes opened and started glowing. Pinkie stumbled and fell, just as two diamond dogs jumped out from the ground in an attempt to catch her, colliding as each grabbed empty air where Pinkie should have been.
The cloaked figure turned towards Zecora. With a flick of her head she removed her hood, exposing bright yellow fur, a blue mane, and an already blazing unicorn horn. Zecora dodged the blast by a mane hair.
“If you desire a duel of spells, I don’t believe you know me well.” Zecora was already spreading the contents of another bag in front of her, forming a vertical disk; it would deflect only a few blasts, but it should buy her the time she would need as she took three potion vials and frantically started to work on them.
Her opponent kept firing blasts at a rapid cadence, even as she spoke. “What, a zebra without any true magical power? You have already lost!”
The unicorn’s last blast shattered the shield, but Zecora was ready. Dripping the potion on her drum, Zecora held it in front of her body, catching the next blast with it. The drum exploded, but its work was done; the blast, reflected, sped towards the unicorn, stunning her.
Taking the chance to look back at the fight below, Zecora saw Pinkie galloping towards the last of the crystals. Jumping, the purple clad pony landed with all four hooves on top of the crystal, shattering it. The net around the luck dragon flickered and vanished, sending the diamond dogs into a state of panic.
The cloaked figure was already fleeing and cursing as she retreated into a hole in the ravine’s walls, one that seemed to have been dug by diamond dogs.
The luck dragon turned her feline head towards Pinkie, speaking for the first time in a gentle voice. “Hello, my strangely clad friend. I’m Felix, the luck dragon. And who might you be?”
Pinkie, in her disguise as the Mare-do-Well, hesitated. Zecora, arriving at the bottom of the ravine with a smile on her face, answered first.
“That mare is a good friend of mine, Pinkie Pie. Now, Pinkie, why don’t you give my friend a hi?”
Pinkie took off her purple mask, legitimate surprise in her face. “Hey, I though my disguise was perfect! How did you find out it was me?”
Zecora’s smile turned enigmatic. “You could never hide your identity from me; my role is to perceive what no other pony can see.”
Author's Note
Feel free to point flaws, errors, or to make suggestions; I'm here to learn.
This story might look a bit rushed; that's because it is. I'm still terrible at making rhyme, so I took far more time with this than I should have, and had to rush the end in order to finish on time for the deadline. I might revisit this story in the coming months, depending on how well I can get at making rhyme.
